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Game Night

Oct 18, 2004

It’s not quite Shoot Club, but Gaming Night is something special nonetheless. It’s a gathering of friends. It’s a gathering of controllers. The five console machines under my TV do all the work. The rest is a fellowship of a normally destructive kind. There’s yelling and screaming. There are takedowns and cut downs. Mothers are mentioned in casual conversation. Few mothers emerge unscathed as a result.

Gaming night has become something of a tradition around these parts, despite its lack of a proper nickname. What started as a regular meeting of a couple guys looking for a gaming fix has morphed into an event, an event that requires planning. Those same guys are a wee bit grown up now. Some have kids. Some have wives. Oh yes, wives. Honey, can I go over Ken’s and play games on Saturday?

The set up for gaming night can range wildly, jumping from a single TV and a few players on a couch to multiple machines and network cables. For this past weekend, which marked the Last Gaming Night Before Child Number 2, I’m leaned towards the later. I brought a second TV downstairs and hooked up a second Xbox. I set up DDR upstairs to entice the occasional passerby.

The DDR pads saw a small share of dancing, mostly due to the determination and gusto of one particular DDR addict. The second Xbox was barely touched, reflecting the group’s dissappointment that Burnout 3, an otherwise awesome game, could only be played by two players at a time.

Most of our time was spent in front of screen number one. The quirky Japanese game Katamari Damacy made its rounds, in more way than one. Mario Kart saw a fair share of action. Throwing giant turtle shells from the back of a pink Cadillac being driven by my partner is my idea of fun. I’m not alone with this sentiment. We capped off the night with a little tennis and a good helping of basketball.

All in all, it was a fun night. With my second namesake on the way, I don’t expect to do this again for a good while. I’ll live. I appreciate the time I get for diversions such as these and, quite frankly, I don’t think my mother’s reputation should take another beating like that for a while.